


Far Too Young to Die

by OveliaGirlHaditRight



Category: Subarashiki Kono Sekai | The World Ends With You
Genre: A New Day references, AU, AU for sure, Alternate Universe, Completely Guessing at Neo's Story and These Characters of Course, Definitely Some Darkness Here, F/M, Gen, Like I Want it to be Canon. But We All Know It Won't Be, Oneshot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-01-10
Packaged: 2021-03-14 22:42:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28678344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OveliaGirlHaditRight/pseuds/OveliaGirlHaditRight
Summary: Me guessing at some of these characters from Neo's stories, because I'm hyped. Nagi-centric. Nagi and Rindo friendship.
Relationships: Hinted at Fret and Nagi, Nagi and Past Husband, Rindo and Nagi Friendship
Comments: 5
Kudos: 7





	Far Too Young to Die

Nagi knew she shouldn’t have been surprised when Rindo came to sit down beside her—as Fret and Minamimoto tried to cook them something to eat over a fire—but she was.

Her entry fee had been the quality about her that kept her obsessions about things from annoying people, after all. And the only one who’d been able to see through her being unsufferable now, was Fret; and Nagi thought that that was probably why she was falling in love with him, even after her own pain with love. Though it was of course neither here nor there, if they didn’t survive this awful week…

But maybe she shouldn’t have been shocked that Rindo had come to join her, Nagi thought now—as she distantly put a strand of hair behind her ear—because Rindo seemed like a nice person: one who was probably too nice and a push-over, if she was being honest with herself. And she couldn’t help wondering just who he’d been before all of this…

“Nagi… if you don’t mind my asking? What did that Reaper mean when he said your dream had been stolen? I know what entry fees are… but your dream was to have your blog, right? And you still have that, so…”

Nagi frowned, as she was for once nothing like her usually energetic self. She… really didn’t want to talk about this. Even if her entry fee wasn’t the most painful part of her story, by far, but still connected to that. But she supposed there would be no harm in telling Rindo this, too. Maybe it would even be therapeutic for her…

“I think you kind of answered your own question, Rindo. I still have my career—which _is_ the most important thing to me—and if the Reapers didn’t take that as my entry fee, what would they have taken instead? …The part of the girl that was _likable_ with her varied opinions. Don’t pretend that you haven’t found me pretty annoying throughout this entire Game.”

Rindo blanched at Nagi’s words, as he pulled his legs away from the street of the Scramble Crossing and put them under his chin, but she noticed he didn’t deny them… probably partly because even in telling him what she just had, she had somewhat phrased that sentence to make it sound like Rindo was stupid. So, who could argue her words after _that_? But thankfully, Rindo didn’t insult Nagi for her cruelty: a cruelty she hadn’t had in her past life.

Instead, he smiled at her and handed her half of the piece of pie that Minamimoto had just given him. Why the math man was warming up cold _pie_ over their fire, Nagi could only guess at… but she didn’t exactly appreciate the way the cherry was now melting onto her hands now. But she was so hungry, she found herself eating it, anyway.

“Thanks for telling me that, Nagi… I know it must be hard. And if you want to know _my_ entry fee, it’s pretty obvious. I’m super shy and don’t- don’t talk to people much. And I prefer it that way. I think there’s even something about me that makes me invisible to most people. But my entry fee was that… people see me now. And I can hide all I want, but they still engage with me… It’s terrifying.”

The next words Nagi wanted to ask then were “how did you die?” And she wondered if Rindo’s death was somewhat connected to her entry fee like her own was, but she dared not. That was too personal, and it would be far too demanding for her to do so.

Instead, she decided to ask Rindo something else that was plaguing her, for if it was true… she doubted even her smart college brain could figure out how to get them through this situation. “Do you think Minamimoto’s right, when he says that what we remember about dying isn’t true? And that really, Shibuya just blew up?”

It wasn’t exactly comforting to think. If her memories weren’t real, what could that say about everything else in this world? Nagi shuddered to think it. But maybe that would have been better than her being murdered by her husband, for promising she’d make enough money to support them by her Internet career, but not quite being able to do that and then him absolutely _losing_ it at her for that.

“I hope not,” Rindo replied with a laugh, as they both heard Minamimoto and Fret arguing about such a thing now. Fret seemed to be of the mind that their memories of their deaths really happened, but they were being killed right as the explosion happened, so the jury was still out on whether or not it was the blast or the other things that had killed them.

“Not for my sake would I necessarily mind that, Nagi. I mean… I stupidly died in plugging in some noise canceling headphones. So that’s not too different from an explosion, anyway. But I hope Fret died the way he thinks he did… since drowning in ice cream sounds like the way to go, if you have to. And because I don’t want to believe this war with a crazy Composer, his super talented Proxy, and whoever else Math Guy talks about is real. Because it doesn’t bode well for us if it is, does it?”

And there was nothing Nagi could say there that Rindo hadn’t already, was there? So, she decided to try and focus on the matter at hand, and try to come up with some plan, after all. “Rindo… while Minamimoto’s distracted… let’s try and figure out why we haven’t been put to sleep after this mission, like we usually are, and if there’s a way someone can make a bomb with the numbers of pi—like with lithium, hydrogen, and beryllium. If there is, Math Guy is surely planning that for us, and I want to beat him at his own game.”

It was surely a cruel world that they lived in now, Nagi thought—getting out her phone and closing her favorite social media app out of sheer will—but a world they still lived in all the same. So that meant they had to fight for it.

**Author's Note:**

> Ehh. I don’t like this ending as much as the rest of this. I didn’t know how to end this fic, but oh well.
> 
> I hope you guys are looking forward to Neo as much as I am:)


End file.
